Borides are utilized in a range of industrial applications due to their unique electrical, thermal, mechanical, and catalytic properties. While many diborides find practical uses as abrasion and oxidation resistant coatings, there is an ongoing search for new phases and compositions that might possess interesting and useful properties.
In recent years, borides of osmium, rhenium, ruthenium, chromium, and tungsten have been studied for their ultra-hardness, superior stiffness, and high oxidation resistance. Interestingly, however, prior to the present disclosure, no experimental evidence existed for iridium diboride even though the other transition metals readily form diborides. Although theoretical calculations have predicted that iridium diboride may be stable in an orthorhombic OsB2-type structure, no evidence existed prior to the present disclosure for an iridium sublattice with an increased level of boron content such as to produce iridium diboride.